Zanzibar Museums / The Open University of Tanzania, Dar-Es-Salaam, Tanzania

"The 'Zanzibaris', an African diaspora in South Africa : a puzzle"

· Gwyn Campbell

McGill.University, Monttréal, Canada

"The significance of the Malagasy slave trade in the Indian Ocean"

· Beatrice Nicolini

Catholic University of the Sacred Heart, Milan, Italy "A glimpse to Indian merchant communities in Zanzibar during 1800: the Topan family through British archive sources"

· Bonginkhosi Sikhondze

University of Swaziland, Kwaluseni, Swaziland "The Indian ocean theatrical social, economic and politial dynamics contribution to the Indian and Atlantic African diaspora in the 16th and 19th centuries"

· preparation of the FirstInternational Gathering in Africa of African Descendants living in Asia, to be held in January 2009 in an African country (Mozambique? Zanzibar? Djibouti?) with a possible future proposal of forming an All-Asia Afro-diasporic